


He's In Entertainment

by distant_rose



Series: Ro Writes One-Shots [1]
Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, CS Secret Santa 2018, F/M, Fluff and Crack, Humor, Social Worker!Emma
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-26
Updated: 2018-12-26
Packaged: 2019-09-27 13:26:44
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,922
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17162795
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/distant_rose/pseuds/distant_rose
Summary: Emma Swan has an amazing boyfriend. He’s smart, funny and kind. After a month and a half of dating, she knows almost everything about him except what he does for a living. The only clue that she has “he’s in entertainment.” Her friends and coworkers think he’s possibly stripper, but Emma isn’t so convinced.





	He's In Entertainment

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Briar0942](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Briar0942/gifts).



> This is a CS Secret Santa gift for cstraaash. It’s been a pleasure to get to know you. I seriously cracked up over the story of the Jesus candle. Anyway, I’m not the amazing and talent welllpthisishappening and nor will I ever be, but I did try to channel some of her amazing New York Rangers-loving essence into this ridiculous fic. Honestly, the events of this fuck would never happen outside of a Hallmark movie and I’m very aware of that but please, relax and enjoy the crack. A special thank you to initiala, bleebug, shireness-says and optomisticgirl for encouraging and helping me with this nonsense.

It all started with a dumbass dresser that she got from Mary-Margaret for free. It wasn’t a nice one. In fact, it was made from cheap plastic and more likely than not bought from Wal-Mart or Amazon or a sketchy corner shop. Emma was willing to bet her left tit (and that was the nice shapely one) that it cost no more than twenty dollars, but Mary-Margaret was giving it to her for free and Emma was in desperate need of some place to store clothes because the closet in her studio apartment in Sunnyside was little more than a hole in the wall.

Emma hadn’t intended to take the subway. In fact, she had intended to Uber home with newly acquired garbage dresser. However, in Emma-like fashion, she had forgot to charge her phone and while waiting for her driver Arantxa (seriously, who named their kid Arantax?), it promptly died on her.

Thus, she was left with little choice other than to lug the damn thing for ten blocks in order to take the 7 Express train from 34th Street.

It wasn’t the heaviest thing that Emma had ever carried with her on the subway (her brother David had that honor a few years back in college after a disastrous party held by some of his criminal justice student buddies at Pace,) but she could feel the judgment of every single person on the train. Normally, in situations like these, she would just ignore everyone and play on her phone but with her primary source of entertainment out of commission, she was forced to stare up at the shitty out of date advertisements that lined the walls.

A sense of relief took hold of her as the gargled voice of the operator announced the 61st Street-Woodside stop. It was a twenty-minute walk to get to her place, but it wasn’t anything she couldn’t handle.

Or so she thought.

While the dresser wasn’t heavy, it made up with bulkiness. Her arms were stretched to the limit and she had to shuffle clumsy across the train in order to make it to the doors, her fingers burning as she fought to keep a good grip.

Her battle with the dresser wasn’t a long one. It was over as soon as she crossed over onto the platform. Her foot got caught in a dip in the uneven concrete, sending her stumbling forward. The dresser slipped from her fingers and she landed ungracefully on top of it, cheeks flushed with embarrassment. Her fellow pedestrians grumbled as they moved around her, muttering unkind things under their breath.

“You alright, love?”

Emma immediately looked up in surprise.

A man in expensive looking athletic gear stood above her. Though he was wearing the hood of his sweatshirt up over his head, she could still make out his face and the concern in his startling blue eyes. He was holding out a hand, silently offering to pull her up. Emma stared at it dumbly. When the seconds ticked by and she didn’t take it, a furrow appeared between his brows.

“You alright?” he repeated and this time she caught a soft lilt attached to his words, making it quite clear he wasn’t a native.

“Yeah,” she replied, finally finding her voice. She brushed her hands against her knees before pushing herself up, ignoring his offered hand. “I’m fine. I promise.”

“You sure you don’t need help?” he asked.

“Yeah, I’m fine,” she sniffed, rolling her shoulders. “It was just a small fall, no biggie. It’s not like you need to take me to Urgent Care or anything. I don’t break that easy.”

“I would never suggest otherwise, love,” he said, raising his hands in mock surrender. “I meant more of in regard to your plastic…thing…It looks like it’s a two-person job.”

“I can handle it.”

“I didn’t say you couldn’t handle it, what I’m saying is that it looks something more efficiently done with two people…”

“Your point?”

“I’m offering to help you, love.”

“Not your love,” she replied, narrowing her eyes. “Look, I don’t know what they taught you where you’re from but where I come from, they taught us stranger danger.”

“Well then, let me make myself less strange,” he said, pulling off his hood and offering her a beaming smile. “I’m Killian Jones.”

His eyebrows rose as he spoke, as if his name was something meaningful. It made her bristle and she gave him her most unimpressed look.

“Okay…is that supposed to mean anything?”

She watched a flicker of shock spread across his face. However, it disappeared a fraction of a second later. If she hadn’t been paying so much attention to his body language, she wouldn’t have caught it.

“No,” he replied, his hand reaching up and scratching behind his ear. “Nothing at all. It’s just my name.”

“Right,” she stated back flatly, unconvinced. “Look, Killian, I appreciate the offer, but I don’t know you and for all I know, Killian isn’t even your real name.”

As soon as the words left her lips, his hand drove in his pocket and he pulled out a handsome leather wallet. Emma looked on, stunned, as he handed her a Canadian driver’s license and a credit card.

“There. That’s my ID and that’s my Master Card. My name is on both of them. Now, please, let me give you a hand or else I’m going to be thinking about you and this giant hunk of plastic all day. So, really, you’ll be doing me a favor.”

She rolled her eyes, looking between the cards in her hand and the earnest expression on his face.

“You’re not going to let this go, are you?”

“Probably not.”

“Ugh. Fine,” she sighed. “You can help me with the dumbass dresser but if you turn out to be a serial killer or something, I should let you know that I have a taser and connections to the NYPD.”

“Duly noted,” Killian responded with a nod before lifting the dresser off the platform with ease. Emma fought the urge to roll her eyes again. Show off.

“Where to?”

“Just follow me.”

They made their way out of the station. Their only struggle was getting the dresser over the ticket gate but afterwards it was relatively smooth sailing. They managed to cover five blocks in roughly the same amount of time it had had taken Emma to do one on her own when she had been lugging the damn thing from Mary-Margaret’s.

When they walked past Calvary Cemetery, Killian finally spoke up. “Where exactly do you live?”

“On the corner of 47thand 46th, across the street from Fresh Taco.”

“You planned on hauling this by yourself for nearly fifteen blocks?” He asked in disbelief.

“I hadn’t planned on anything,” she sighed. “I was going to take an Uber.”

“What happened?”

“My phone died.”

“That’s some rotten luck there, love.”

“Again, not your love, but yeah it is.”

“Though, perhaps not, since you met my dashing self who was more than willing to help you move this…whatever it is….”

“It’s a dresser,” she replied drily.

“It’s something alright.”

“Hey! Don’t insult my dresser! I got it for free!”

“And yet you still overpaid,” he remarked with a quirk of his lips. If Emma hadn’t been helping carry the plastic monstrosity in question, she would have slapped him. Only she could insult her free plastic dresser.

They continued their light-hearted banter down Queens Boulevard before finally turning onto 46thstreet, hitting the home stretch. When they got to her building, she gave him an apologetic smile as she fished out her keys and unlocked the door to the main entrance.

“You’re not going to like me,” she said with a nervous laugh.

“Why wouldn’t I like you? I like you so far and you just had me carry this lump of plastic for twenty minutes,” Killian asked, quirking an eyebrow.

“Smooth.” She snorted. “But this is the part where I tell you that I live on the fifth floor of this dump and the elevator hasn’t been working in about…six months.”

He didn’t react in the way she expected him. He stared at her for a moment before bursting out in the laugher, placing the dresser down carefully and placing his hands on his sides as if to stop them from splitting open.

“Of course, naturally,” he chuckled, shaking his head and wiping away nonexistent tears. “I wouldn’t have expected anything less.”

Killian hauled the dresser over his shoulder as if it was nothing once more and raised his eyebrows at her. He nodded his head towards the stairwell.

“Well, lead on.”

They ascended up the stairway. Every third or fourth step, Emma looked behind her to see if he was still following her, but he wasn’t having any trouble at keeping up. It was only the narrow turns in the stairway that posed a problem for him as the dresser was wide and had to be maneuvered carefully in order to squeeze through.

When they reached her apartment, she let out a sigh of relief and turned to him with a huge smile. Though she was home at least an hour later than she had been expecting, her mission of the day had been complete. It had gone a lot smoother than she had been expecting when her phone had died on her and that was all thanks to Killian.

“So…what are you doing tonight?”

“Honestly, nothing. I was on my way home actually.”

“Oh, where do you live?” she asked curiously.

“Ummmm…on the Upper West Side.”

“Manhattan,” she said with a frown. “What the hell were you doing on the 7 train?”

“This is a bit embarrassing, but I was on my way home from meeting with a family friend who lives Astoria and I wasn’t paying attention when I got on the train and I got on the wrong side without realizing it. Anyway, as I was trying to catch the correct train, you came along, and I couldn’t stand by and watch you carry that giant piece of junk by yourself.

“Well, I would like to thank you by taking you out for a drink. Is that okay?”

“You don’t have to do that,” he said, shaking his head. However, his attempt to be courteous was undermined by the small smile playing on his lips.

“I know I don’t have to, but I want to. C’mon, I know a good place.”

She took him down two blocks to one of her favorite places in the universe – the Jar. It was a super chill, no frills dive bar that she and David had discovered when they were in college. When they were young and a little more broke than they were now, they used to fill up on free peanuts and play arcade games while drunk every weekend. They didn’t frequent it as much as they did in undergrad but occasionally, they would stop by and take advantage of the ten-dollar pitcher deal.

As soon as they walked into the restaurant, Killian pulled on a pair of shades. It was such a casual movement on his part that Emma almost didn’t find weird.

“What’s with the sunglasses? It’s October.”

“I have sensitive eyes,” he replied. It was a lie and an obvious one, but Emma let it go. It wasn’t that big of a deal. He wanted to wear sunglasses indoors in autumn, then who was she to stop him?

They sat in Emma’s usual booth adjacent to the bar. The bartender nodded in their direction, already pouring their drinks. Kelly, one of the waitresses that Emma had gotten friendly with in the past few years, dropped off a bowl of peanuts without saying a word. It was in the middle of the day and Emma knew Kelly was more focused on the week’s shipment of alcohol more than waiting on tables. There weren’t many people in the Jar aside from a group of old men, whom Emma recognized them as regulars, gathered around one end of the bar in order to watch some sporting event.

As another waitress arrived with two pints of Heineken, Emma shoved peanuts into her mouth without much tact. Killian chuckled.

“Like nuts, do you?”

“Oh, shut up,” she said without any heat. “I’m a sucker for free food, which is why I used to come here a lot.”

“So, you’re a local then?”

“No actually. I’m from everywhere, but I guess if I had to pick one, I would pick Arizona because I was there the longest,” Emma replied with a shrug.

“Did you like Arizona?”

“It was alright,” she shrugged. “I mean, I didn’t have the best memories there and I lived in the southern part of the state where it’s literally hotter than hell nine months a year but it was okay. The weather sometimes got to you though, it’s one of the reasons I moved here. I love snow and cold weather, plus you can’t beat the pizza.”

“That’s for sure,” he agreed, taking a sip of his beer. Emma caught his eyes glancing over her shoulder at the men by the bar. She fought the urge to follow his gaze and see what all the fuss was about and attempted to focus on strictly on Killian’s words. “You can’t beat Juliana’s on Old Fulton.”

“We’ll have to agree to disagree because nothing can beat Gaby’s, but that’s not important. What brought you here?” she asked, throwing a few empty peanut shells onto the floor.

“What makes you think I wasn’t always a New Yorker?”

“The accent kinda gives you away there, Prince Henry,” she replied with a roll of her eyes. “When did you move over from England?”

“I actually didn’t move over to here from England,” he replied, giving her a small smirk over his beer glass. “I moved here from Toronto. Like you, I’ve lived a bit of everywhere. Spent eleven years of my life in London before my parents split and my mom moved back to Canada to be with her family. She was from Ontario, you see. I moved to the States roughly eight years ago. I lived in Chicago for a while then I was in Pittsburgh for two years before coming here.”

“Pittsburgh?” Emma wrinkled her nose. “Why Pittsburgh?”

“Job opportunity.”

“Oh yeah, and what do you do? With an Upper West Side apartment, I’m assuming you’re some sort of investment banker or real estate mogul.”

Before he could answer, there was a large commotion on the other side of the room. The old men at the bar were shouting excitedly, jeering and holding their bar glasses high in the air. Emma made a face. It was so typical of sports fans to be loud, obnoxious and inconsiderate of others around them.

“You alright, love?”

“Yeah, I just hate sports at times,” she replied with a roll of her eyes.

“Pardon?”

“Sports,” she repeated. “I personally think they’re boorish. The athletes I went to school with were always obnoxious and got special treatment because of it. I had pretty amazing grades in high school and I had to take out more loans than should be possible in order to attend school meanwhile Donny Dipshit has a 2.5 GPA, barely knows how to read but he gets a full ride because he can throw a ball through a net.”

“Ah,” he said, shifting in his seat. “Well, not all athletes are like that…”

“Most of them,” she asserted. “I tutored the entire hockey team in undergrad for philosophy. It was worse than herding cats.”

“So, hockey isn’t your thing, huh?”

“Oh yeah, I honestly can’t stand it.”

Killian shifted awkwardly in his seat, looking a cross between uncomfortable and ashamed. Her eyes went wide with realization and it suddenly hit that he possibly hadn’t been watch the sports hooligans but the hockey game itself.

“Oh my god! You’re not a fan, are you?”

“Something like that,” he replied with an awkward laugh.

“Oh sorry. Okay, no more sports talk then. Let’s back to the subject at hand, what do you do?”

If anything, Killian looked more uncomfortable. He grabbed his Heineken and took a long sip. Emma waited, wondering why he was acting so weird.

“Ummm…. I’m…in entertainment…:

“Entertainment?” Emma blinked, putting down her beer and staring at him. “You mean you’re a stripper?”

“No! No! No!” He exclaimed vehemently. “I’m not a stripper, I promise…it’s more like special skills and stunt stuff. I go across the country and I…perform…skills…”

“Still sounds like stripping,” Emma replied, giving him a funny look.

“No stripping, definitely no nudity involved. It’s…complicated, but it pays well.”

“Oooookay.”

“Let’s talk less about me and more about you…what do you do?”

“I’m a social worker.”

“A social worker? Wow. That’s tough work,” he said softly. “How did you get into that?”

Emma didn’t know how it happened, but she found herself telling him about her time in foster care and how it inspired her to get involved in social work so she could help other children out who were in a similar situation. Killian asked a lot of good questions, showing true curiosity rather than the feigned interest she so often saw from the various dates she went on. She had half expected him to run out the door when she mentioned foster care, but he hadn’t so much as blinked.

When she told him this, he revealed that his own past wasn’t much different. Not long after his mother had spirited him and his brother away to Toronto, she had died due to complications while giving birth to their younger sister. He and his siblings had been bounced around between relatives until his older brother Liam had gotten obtained guardianship over him and his sister Alice.

After hearing about the disinterest and borderline neglect given to him as a child by his own blood relatives, it was quite clear why Killian hadn’t been so judgmental of her. Orphans recognized orphans.

They stayed at the bar much longer than Emma had anticipated and she was disappointed when Killian told her that he had to head out because he had a business trip in the morning.

“Where are you going?”

“Chicago, then LA, San Jose and Anaheim…I’ll be back in New York early November.”

“That sounds incredibly busy,” she commented, raising her eyebrows.

“It is,” he confirmed, staring at her intently. “But I would like to see you when I get back if that’s okay?”

“When exactly do you get back?”

“The morning of the second. It’s a Friday. Can I see you that night?”

“That night? Don’t you want a day of rest after all that traveling.”

“Nah. I’m rather used it,” he said with a shrug. “And besides I have an event on Sunday so it’s better to meet Friday than Saturday. I like to keep a clear head before those things.”

“Okay.”

“Okay,” he repeated. “Was that a yes to Friday?”

“Yeah,” she laughed. “It was.”

“Excellent.” The smile that spread across his face was larger than any she had ever seen before and she thought about it long after he was gone.

He didn’t just see her on November 2nd. He saw her on the 5th, 13th, 14th, 18thand 25th as well. Their dates together were pretty great despite the fact that she had never been to his Upper West side apartment and he hadn’t been back to her Sunnyside abode since the day they met. It was the longest adult relationship Emma had ever had without sex coming into the picture. With that being said, the kisses between them were pretty heated and hands had been wandering to places that weren’t necessarily appropriate for public places.

Despite the fact they were both busy, they texted constantly. Sometimes, particularly in the mornings and during the early evening hours it would take him two or three hours to respond but he never ignored any of her messages.

He had a habit of sending her some of the most random things from funny gifs to sarcastic memes. He had a wry and odd sense of humor, but she found that she rather liked it.

The last text message he had sent her was of a small puppy bothering an adult cat and she couldn’t help but laugh at it.

“What’s got you so smiley?”

Emma looked up from her phone to see her best friend, sister-in-law and fellow social worker Mary-Margaret giving her an inquisitive look. She immediately placed her phone screen down on her desk in order to keep her from reading Killian’s text messages. It did her no good as the office secretary Ruby snatched it and immediately typed in her password. A wolfish grin took hold of her face.

“Emma has a boyfriend.”

“I do not!” she responded automatically.

“You do too,” Ruby shot back, scrolling through the messages. “You talk to him constantly and you’ve been giggly for the past month at least and you’re never giggly. You either have a new boyfriend or you’re possessed by an evil spirit and we need to perform an exorcism, like, now.”

“Fine, fine, alright. I’ve been seeing someone,” Emma replied with a roll of her eyes.

“Do you guys hear that?” Ruby snickered.

“Oh my god! Emma! That’s wonderful!” Mary-Margaret beamed. “What’s his name?”

“Killian.”

“Killian? Like the hockey player Killian?” Mary-Margaret asked.

“The hockey player?”

“Yeah, there’s a player on the Rangers named Killian. It’s like Killian James? Killian Jones? Killian Jackson? Anyway, your brother is obsessed with him. He hated him when he played for the Blackhawks and the Pens but now, he’s on the Rangers and I think he’s begrudgingly David’s favorite now. I’m thinking I’m going to get him a Killian Jackson? Jones? Whatever his name is jersey for Christmas.”

“He’s pretty hot,” Ruby stated, still smirking. “If they played without helmets, I might actually watch hockey.”

“Well, my Killian definitely isn’t hockey Killian or whatever,” Emma replied with a roll of her eyes.

“And what does not-hockey player Killian do?”

It was the question that Emma had been dreading since she started dating Killian. She knew almost everything about him except his job and whenever she asked about it, he got all weird and would dodge the question. Since this was the easiest relationship she had ever been in, she had been letting it slide.

“He’s umm…in entertainment.”

Both Mary-Margaret and Ruby’s eyebrows rose to their hairlines as they regarded her.

“I’m sorry, what?” Mary-Margaret asked, confused.

“Are you dating a stripper, Emma?”

“No…it’s more like stunt work, I think?”

“You think?” Ruby repeated flatly. “You don’t actually know.”

“It’s kinda complicated to explain but yeah, he kinda performs complicated stunts and skills for people. He travels for it a lot but apparently it pays well because he literally has an apartment in the Upper West side.”

“Okay, he’s not a regular old stripper…but maybe a Chippendale dancer? Tell me, he fit?”

“Pretty fit,” Emma confirmed. “Definitely more in shape than me. It’s kinda depressing.”

After her conversation with Ruby and Mary-Margaret, Emma became determined to ask her boyfriend what exactly he did for a living. She had a plan. She had picked out a restaurant that would provide them with some privacy. She had a speech planned out and even dedicated an entire section on how he shouldn’t be ashamed of saying he was a Chippendale dancer. However, none of that came into the fruition.

On the day she was supposed to confront Killian with her suspicions, disaster had struck in one of her cases. Emma had been assigned to ten-year old Henry Mills, a boy whose teachers had been convinced he was being  abused by his adoptive mother despite lack of evidence. On the day she was supposed to interview Henry for what seemed like the millionth time, he had somehow indigested a form of poison and had to be rushed to the hospital. He had officially slipped into a coma by the time Emma had arrived at the hospital.

Emma was used to hard cases. The amount of abuse she witnessed towards children and domestic partners on a daily basis was appalling but she had always been able to shut it out and push forward with the knowledge that she could help these people live better lives.

Henry had been special, and he had been special from day one. He had vaguely collaborated with his teachers’ suspicions, but he had insisted that he had to stay with his adoptive mother because he made her better and she was capable of being a good person. He was an eternal optimist, something that went entirely against Emma’s cynical nature, but he got under her skin without even trying and the very fact that he might not wake up was devastating to her.

For the first time in their relationship, Killian didn’t reply when she texted him that their date was off. Her phone had indicated that he had read it thirty minutes ago but hadn’t responded. Squashing the impulse to text him a tirade of fury, she immediately opened a bottle of white wine and took a healthy swig.

As she was about to polish off the entire bottle, there was a loud knock on her door. Unsure of what exactly she had heard, she squinted at it suspiciously. The knocking came again, this time more urgently. She wobbled as she walked towards the door and opened it.

Killian Jones was standing there, breathing heavy. He was wearing an eschewed tie and his hair was sticking in all directions but none of that mattered when he pulled her into a fierce hug and held her tightly, as if she was something precious.

“I’m so sorry about Henry,” he murmured into her hair. “Do you want to talk about it?”

She didn’t answer him, only pulled his head down so that she could kiss him. It wasn’t the most coordinated move in the world; their lips smashed together so hard that their teeth clanked, and the angle wasn’t particularly good but after a few moments, Killian changed it and the kiss became something else entirely.

He moved her back into her apartment, pushing the door close aggressively behind him. The entire frame rattled with the force of it but not once did their lips disconnect.

When the kiss ended, Emma’s hands flew to his tie and began to frantically unknot it. As she was just about to pull it off, his hands pulled away from her waist and grabbed hers; his right thumb rubbing against the webbing between her thumb and forefinger gently.

“Are you okay?” he asked gently.

“No,” she said roughly. “But you can make it better.”

“As long as that’s what you want…”

“It’s always what I want,” she whispered back before kissing him fiercely.

He let go off her hands, running his down her body until they grasped her firmly around the backs of her thighs, pulling her up and encouraging her to wrap them around his waist. When she followed his silent instructions, he then carried her across the apartment to the tiny bedroom that held only her small bed and the plastic dresser he had helped bring over on the day they met.

As she watched him awkwardly fumble through shedding his clothes, she came to one conclusion. Killian wasn’t coordinated enough at taking off his clothes to be Chippendale dancer or even a basic level stripper.

She also decided she didn’t give a rat’s ass what he did for a living. Killian Jones was a good man and he was hers.

A week later, he was back on the road again and wouldn’t be back again for five days. While she missed him, she was drowning in work. The holiday season was a tough time to be a social worker. The stress of it often caused a skyrocket in abuse incidents and it seemed like every other mother she interviewed was trying to cover up bruises with make-up. Domestic violence was an ugly beast and Emma had studied Battered Woman Syndrome thoroughly in her degree but even while knowing that there was nothing she could do, she wanted to shake these women and scream at them leave their horrible partners.

She was typing out her report on the Zimmer twins when Ruby plopped down on the seat in front of her desk.

“Don’t you have stuff to do?” Emma asked, not looking away from her computer.

“Elsa is looking over the paperwork on the Gold-French case to see if they have enough evidence to terminate the father’s paternal rights alongside doing the protective order,” Ruby replied. “I’m just wondering if you’re bringing your Chippendale boyfriend to the charity event tonight.”

“What?”

“Not-hockey Killian or whatever his name is? Mr. Entertainment?”

“I know who my boyfriend is, thank you very much,” Emma replied with a roll of her eyes. “I was referring to the second half of your statement.”

“The charity event?”

“Yes, it’s next week.”

“No, Emma,” Ruby said slowly. “It’s tonight.”

“No…it’s can’t be!”

“It is…Today’s the 13th and…” She took her phone out of her pocket, opened the calendar app and shoved it in Emma’s face. “Look at that? The charity event with the Rangers is the 13th! Hopefully, Chippendale-Killian can meet hockey-Killian!”

“What do you mean?”

“Emma, dude, did you even read the memo? The event for the Garden of Dreams Foundation…which is run by the Madison Square Garden Company…which owns the Rangers and the Knicks. We’ve worked with them a couple of times…don’t you remember?”

“Honestly no,” Emma said, rubbing her temples. “I actually do my best to avoid anything that focuses more on publicity than helping out kids and do real, actual work.”

“Well, you can’t avoid this. Just imagine all the eye candy that’s going to be there. I know you’re in relationship, Emma, but that doesn’t mean you can’t look!”

“I’m going to have a migraine…” she mumbled.

“Well, take an ibuprofen and suck it up, kiddo.”

The rest of Emma’s day doesn’t get any better. She spilled coffee all over her new blouse. Her interview with one of the fathers she was investigating went terribly when he tried to attack thus leading to the police getting involved and her filling out yet another statement. On top of that, she had lost her MetroCard and had to buy a new one.

By the time she got home, she had only 45 minutes to get dressed and ready for the Garden of Dreams event. As she was about to get into the shower, her phone started ringing.

It was Killian.

“Hey babe, I got some bad news,” she said quickly as she undid the buttons of her ruined blouse. “The charity event I was going to go to next week is actually tonight. I totally fucked up.”

“Swan, love, we need to talk.”

The blood in Emma’s veins went cold at his words; fingers stopping in their tracks. She turned away from her task and looked down at her phone.

_We need to talk._

It was words that she had heard her entire life; from her adoptive parents, from foster parents, from friends, from boyfriends, from co-workers. Whenever someone said those four words, she knew she was rarely in for good news.

“Is there a problem?” she asked quietly.

“It’s not so much of a problem as I need to tell you something,” he said, sounding stressed. “About my job.”

“Is it serious?”

“I hope not. I mean, it’s nothing new and everything seems fine. It’s just I think it’s best that you’re aware that I—” “If it’s not life-changing or serious, let’s talk about this later, okay?” She cut him off. “Look, I want to have this conversation as much as you do but I have to get ready for the charity dinner with all of those meathead overpaid hockey players.”

“Swan…” he sounded strained, but Emma cut him off again.

  
“I know, I know, I know, you like them but I’ve yet to meet a decent one. Look, we’ll talk about this later. Okay? Bye.” She didn’t wait for a response before hanging up.

She got ready in minimal time, choosing to wear her tried and true navy-blue dress that she wore to the Department of Child, Youth and Families Christmas party last year. She was sparse with her make-up, putting on only mascara and some lipstick. She didn’t have anyone to impress at this party, regardless of what Ruby.

She had a boyfriend and he wasn’t going to be there.

Emma hated events like these. Whenever she attended these, she never felt like she belonged and though it might have been her paranoia, she always felt like every woman in the room was judging her non-designer dress.

Thankfully upon arrival, she immediately found Mary-Margaret and David. They were standing not too far from the main entrance, David constantly looking around. There was no doubt in Emma’s mind that he was trying to find one of the professional hockey players attending this event in the crowd.

“Hey!” Mary-Margaret greet, hugging her. “Where’s your Chippendale?”

“Chippendale? What Chippendale?” David asked, tearing his eyes away from the crowd and staring at his wife in alarm.

“Emma has a boyfriend who is…in entertainment?”

  
“In entertainment? What the hell does that mean? Is he a stripper or something?”

“Hence why we call him the Chippendale,” Mary-Margaret chuckled.

“You’re dating a stripper, Emma?” David asked her, ignoring his wife.

“No. Like Mary-Margaret said. He’s in entertainment. He has some special skills or stunts or something that he performs for people all over the country.”

“That sounds awfully like a roundabout way of saying he’s a stripper, Emma.”

“Well, he definitely isn’t because he’s really not that coordinated at taking off clothes,” she snapped back.

“Emma!” Mary-Margaret choked on her drink. “You slept with him?”

“I’ve been dating him for like a month and a half! What did you expect!”

Mary-Margaret gaped at her wordlessly, but Emma didn’t wait for her to respond before walking past her to their table. As she was getting to their table, a man crossed the ballroom stage with a pompous strut. He smiled as he brought a large microphone to his lips.

“Hello ladies and gentlemen, thank you for coming. Tonight is a very special event is going to help children all over New York overcome obstacles whether it be poverty, family disruption, illness or prejudice. This organization is dedicated to helping them achieve and overcome. Along with this, these children get the opportunity to meet proper role models, the amazing athletes playing for our New York Rangers and our New York Knicks. Today, the New York Rangers mentored some of the disadvantaged children sponsored by the Ronald McDonald House and some mentors are here with us tonight as guests of honor and I’ll introduce them now…”

“Oh great,” Emma muttered, rolling her eyes. “Bring on the March of the Meatheads.”

“Now, let me introduce to you…Will Scarlet…Robin Locksley…Arthur Penn…Killian Jones…”

Emma stopped listening as a very familiar head of dark hair and blue eyes came onto the stage. The glass of champagne that she had been given at the door slipped from her fingers and crashed onto the table, spilling everywhere. She barely acknowledged as she continued to stare at the man she knew and didn’t know at all.

Her boyfriend was standing up there.

Not hockey-Killian and hockey-Killian were the same fucking person

“Emma…Emma…Emma!” Mary-Margaret shook her arm, trying to get her attention.

It took all of her will power tear her eyes away from Killian and look at her best friend. She was giving her a concerned look.

“Are you okay?”

“I’m dating hockey-Killian,” Emma blurted out, still stunned.

“What?”

“My boyfriend is on that fucking stage!”

“I thought your boyfriend was a stripper!” David exclaimed, staring at her with wide eyes.

“He said he was in entertainment!” Emma hissed back.

“Well, I guess in a way, he was right…professional sports are a form of entertainment…” David replied, scratching his chin. “I can’t believe you had sex with the centerman for the New York Rangers.”

“I need you to shut up right now.”

Emma rubbed at her temples, feeling her migraine coming back with vengeance. When her eyes returned back to the stage, she found that Killian was staring directly at her. His face was relatively impassive, but his eyes bore into hers with an intensity she couldn’t handle. She looked away, digging her fingernails into her arm.

When the presentation was over, Emma made her escape. She left the table and went in search of a restroom. As she made her way into the hallway, someone grabbed her arm. The unexpected grab caused her to spin backwards.

“I’ve been looking for you…”

It was Killian. He was looking at her with the same intense look in his eyes and Emma wasn’t sure she could handle it at the moment.

“We need to talk,” he said softly.

“Oh buddy, that’s putting it mildly,” she replied, narrowing her eyes at him.

He led her further down the hallway until they came across a small empty banquet room. Killian turned on the lights and closed the door behind them. Emma stood stiffly, staring at him with her arms crossed.

“You look beautiful…” he said, scratching behind his ear as he regarded her with the face of a condemned man.

“Cut the shit,” she snapped. “Why didn’t you tell me!?”

“I tried to tell you today, over the phone—” “Killian, we’ve been dating for a nearly month and a half now! You should have told me the truth! You should have told me from the beginning that you played for the Rangers! All of my friends legitimately think you’re a stripper for fuck’s sake!”

“Why the hell would they think I’m stripper?”

“Because all I could tell them is that you’re ‘in entertainment!’ What else are they going think? Seriously, what is wrong with you? What? Did you think if I found out that I would take your money or something? Do you not trust me?”

“Quite the opposite, love,” he responded, a muscle jumping in his jaw. “I thought you would leave me.”

“Why the hell would you think that?”

“Because I’m a meathead athlete!” Killian responded, mirroring Emma’s posture and crossing his arms in front of his chest as well. “And you always go on and on and on about how sports are dumb, and athletes are overpaid, arrogant meatheads.”

“You’re not a meathead. You’re kind, thoughtful and occasionally once upon a blue moon funny,” Emma replied, shaking her head. “But the fact you weren’t dishonest with me over what you do is honestly what’s upsetting me here. Killian, I hate sports. I don’t get them, but don’t’ think just because I don’t get them doesn’t mean I’m going to break up with you over it. It’s what you do. It’s your job, just like my job is social work. Your job is not a deal breaker, you lying to me could very well be.”

“I’m sorry, love, I was immature, and I let my insecurities get the better of me.:

“I get that. I really do, but Killian, if you want this relationship to last once we walk out that door and to actually mean something, I need you to tell me the truth.”

“Of course, love.”

“No. I’m dead serious. This…this is not okay, and I get that you were scared and you’re sorry, but this shows me that you would rather deceive me than tell me that something that I’m not going to like.”

“Emma, I promise you, from here and on out, I will never lie or withhold information from you again…unless it’s a birthday present or a surprise party.”

“How very attorney-like of you to put conditions,” she responded wryly.

“I was thinking of going into law if hockey fell through,” he said with a dry chuckle before his expression sobered. “But are those acceptable conditions to you?”

“Yes,” she said, “but know this, buddy, if I catch you lying again. You’re out. Your ass is grass. I don’t care how many dollars you’re making.”

“You have yourself a deal, love,” he said, giving her a wry smile. “Shall we have ourselves a kiss to seal the deal.”

“Oh, I’m not done negotiating yet,” Emma replied. “You fucked up royally. You’re not getting off easy.”

“Name your terms.”

“You are to call me before and after every game,” she started. “You’re also to help me run the Christmas donation drive in two weeks you’ve been trying to weasel out of, you are to keep your shoes off my coffee table, and you’re going to meet my brother David and pretend he’s a normal person when he fangirls over you like a loser, and on top of that, you’re going to help me procure game tickets for him for Christmas.”

“So…if I’m getting this straight, you want more phone calls, the donation drive, shoes off the coffee table, a chat with your brother and game tickets,” he repeated. “Considered them all done.”

“Excellent.”

“Can we kiss now?” he asked, rubbing his thumb against her cheek.

“If we must.”

 


End file.
